Sudanese seek alternatives as civil war hits fuel supply

In war-torn Sudan, donkey carts replace motor traffic for urgent hospital trips amid fuel shortages and conflict.

In war-torn Sudan, where chaos and fuel shortages have ground normal motor traffic to a halt, people once more rely on donkey carts — even for urgent trips to the hospital.

In a small town south of the capital Khartoum, Hussein Ali has been busy carting patients to a clinic on a rickety wooden carriage that now serves as an ambulance.

“Just an hour ago, I brought a woman who went into labour in a village 15 kilometre away,” Mr. Ali said near a clinic in Tamboul, Al-Jazira State.

“The carriage is the only way to get patients from villages to the hospital,” he said of his vehicle, called a caro in Sudanese Arabic and now once more a common sight in many States.

Sudan has been rocket by a brutal civil war that has killed thousands — including up to 15,000 in a single Darfur town, according to UN experts — and displaced millions since last April.

The conflict has pitted the regular army of de facto leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.

Since the RSF overran Al-Jazira State, fuel suppliers from army-controlled areas “have not resupplied petrol stations in Al-Jazira”, said a petrol station worker who requested anonymity.